Nobody heard them, the 900,
But still they lay screaming.
We were much further out than they were,
And not waving but drowning.

Poor migrants, lured to a better life –
Now they’re dead.
It must have been too hot for them
In Gambia, Senegal, Syria, they said,

Oh no no no, it was too hot always,
Still, the stranded ones lay screaming.
We were much further out than they were,
And not waving but drowning.

It was a cold dark night
Sailing for Hopes for Dreams
An Island beyond the sea
A home of victory
A home that will
Now never be yours 

Flashes of light
In the torrent of the sea
Father and child
Held on tight
Struggled for their dream
Before my eyes
I saw their dream die
In the cold black pit of the sea
I want to say
I am Sorry

I am Sorry
To all voyagers
Of despair and courage
Their lost Hopes and Dreams
Crossing to
An Island beyond the sea

*To the Hundreds of Souls lost on the journey to Lampedusa

Vacation

I have been invited to the golden coast of Spain
White beaches blue sea, cooling in the sun.

The Mediterranean postcard beauty, tempting
It is also full of thousands of dead bodies.

On days after storm, it is possible to walk on bodies
From Tripoli to Lampedusa and not getting wet.

The sea that crashes ashore on coastal Portugal
Is green, refreshing I will stick to the Atlantic sea.

AFTER LONDON

The silence deepens.

As if it were a living being
it forages in the forest.

The next step taken
takes me out of the present

into history
into fantasy

as if I have become
a fairy story.

Tropes trooping through
the clearing.

The huff and puff
of a big bad wind.

The silence broken.

Inside  the belly
of the forest

where green is
the only colour seen

lies a partly
digested house.

Vines snaking through
its empty windows.

Its roof thrown
upon its floor.

Its wall crumbling
back into nature.

I sit and read my
Richard Jefferies.

A finger of frond
reading along with me

eager to turn
the next page.

The silence
deepens.


*


Richard Jefferies...he of the beautiful nature writing that influenced the nature writing of poet Edward Thomas.

Jefferies's novel, After London (1885), can be seen as an early example of "post-apocalyptic fiction": after some sudden and unspecified catastrophe has depopulated England, the countryside reverts to nature, and the few survivors to a quasi-medieval way of life.

The house gone to ruin that nature takes back is my memory of numerous houses I have come across including even one on the island of Lampedusa.

AFTER LONDON

The silence deepens.

As if it were a living being
it forages in the forest.

The next step taken
takes me out of the present

into history
into fantasy

as if I have become
a fairy story.

Tropes trooping through
the clearing.

The huff and puff
of a big bad wind.

The silence broken.

Inside  the belly
of the forest

where green is
the only colour seen

lies a partly
digested house.

Vines snaking through
its empty windows.

Its roof thrown
upon its floor.

Its wall crumbling
back into nature.

I sit and read my
Richard Jefferies.

A finger of frond
reading along with me

eager to turn
the next page.

The silence
deepens.

*

Richard Jeffeeries...he of the beautiful nature writing that influenced the nature writing of poet Edward Thomas.
Jefferies's novel, After London (1885), can be seen as an early example of "post-apocalyptic fiction": after some sudden and unspecified catastrophe has depopulated England, the countryside reverts to nature, and the few survivors to a quasi-medieval way of life.
The house gone to ruin that nature takes back is my memory of numerous houses I have come across including even one on the island of Lampedusa